Federal Housing Administration

The Federal Housing Administration aimed to provide housing for Americans during the Great Depression. Housing was deemed essential to one’s freedom. While the official purpose was to assist everyone in America, the system was full of discrimination. Mostly all local governments, North and South, wanted the housing that was constructed through the Federal Housing Administration to be racially segregated. The neighborhoods built for white families were much nicer than those built for black and Mexican families. In extreme cases, a single minority family living on a block would make the federal government not back mortgages for any of the other houses on the block.

Another way the Federal Housing Administration discriminated against minorities was by adding a clause into the contract of houses they built declaring that the family could not sell the house to a minority family. This kept neighborhoods designated as either white or minority. Since the federal government was enacting these policies, private firms followed suit. They also would discriminate and try to keep neighborhoods segregated. The government could have used the Federal Housing Administration to establish a more equal society but it did not. While the Federal Housing Administration appeared on paper to help everyone in America get proper housing, whites benefitted much more than minorities.